Your next read

Mortgage services generate $2 billion a year in commissions. With major publishers now moving into this space, LANCE CLATWORTHY looks at news media readers intending to buy a property and those intending to obtain a mortgage. Hot property, hot prospects.

2m news media readers intend to purchase real estate

With 2.2m Australians intending to buy a property in the next 12 months, we find that 2m of them are readers of news media. Compared with those who do not read news media, readers are 12 per cent more likely to be looking to buy. So news media is an efficient media for real estate advertisers with the efficiencies most marked in national newspapers where readers are 35 per cent more likely to be buying. Community newspapers and the property section of the newspaper are also especially attractive in this respect.

Publisher’s real estate websites have been visited by 400,000 in the last 4 weeks. So these websites reach less than a quarter of the prospects that news media reaches, but there’s big bang for the buck – there’s a high incidence of potential buyers among the audience that the advertiser pays for. Compared with those who do not read news media, visitors to these real estate websites are 71 per cent more likely to be prospects.

Hot spots for readers are Sydney, Melbourne and regional WA

With 31,000 prospects, a geographic view of intentions shows that news media readers in Regional WA are the most likely to be intending to purchase. Compared to non-readers, they’re 47 per cent more likely to be buying, making real estate advertising in regional WA all the more attractive.

Not surprisingly the bigger nuggets are in the metro areas. It’s Sydney (495k), Melbourne (385k) and Brisbane (115K) which offer the opportunity to capture the most prospects. Readers in these cities are also more likely to be prospects (respectively +39%, +16% and +25% more likely).

Aged 25 to 34 are the most keen to purchase

Readers aged 35 to 54 represent 42 per cent of all readers who intend to buy in the next 12 months. That makes them a hugely important demographic. However, in relative terms, it’s actually the 25 to 34 year olds who are most keen – 17 per cent of them are intending to buy. We also see a skew on readers who have a household income of $120k pa or more – 17% of them intend to buy, too.

Intentions to obtain mortgages are past their recent peak

Now looking at mortgages, 7 per cent of Australians aged 14+ are intending to obtain at least one mortgage in the next 12 months. While these intentions are shy of their recent peaks, they are yet to display real signs of ongoing decline.

881,000 Australians intend to obtain an investment mortgage in the next 12 months – that’s 3 per cent shy of the peak in the 12 months to November 2016, but we should acknowledge that recent increases in “interest only” mortgage charges may lead to further reduced intentions.

Similarly, intentions to obtain an owner occupier mortgage are at 857,000 – just 2 per cent shy of the peak in the 12 months to October 2016.

1.2m news media readers intending to obtain 1.6m mortgages

Of the 1.6m mortgages that news media readers are intending to obtain in the next 12 months, 52 per cent of them are for investment purposes, but this rises to 55 per cent for community newspapers – community newspaper readers are more investment focused.

NSW, ACT and WA mortgage intentions

NSW has the biggest inclination to be obtaining any mortgage. In this state, 450k news media readers will be looking for 614k mortgages – compared with all news media readers, that makes NSW readers 20 per cent more likely to be taking out a mortgage in the next 12 months.

ACT and WA readers are more investment focused. ACT (65%) and WA (56%) demonstrate a high propensity for intended mortgages to be for investment purposes rather than for a house to live in.

News media reaches 91% of real estate buyers

With 2m readers intending to buy a property and 1.2m readers intending to obtain 1.6m mortgages in the next 12 months, news media allows the advertiser to achieve mass coverage of prospects. Relative to non-readers, news media offers strength across all channels and all states. However, it’s publishers’ real estate websites, national papers, community newspapers and the property section of a newspaper where readers are most likely to be intending to buy a property. Hot property, hot prospects and efficient targeting for advertisers.

Source: emma™ 12 months to April 2017. Readership based on last four weeks. Survey conducted by Ipsos MediaCT, people 14+ ; Nielsen DRM April 2017, People 14+ only.